Bouak� (C�te-d�Ivoire) The Ivorian minister of New Information and Communication Technologies (NTIC), Ahmed Bakayoko on Tuesday reopened the post office of Bouake, the headquarters of the ex-rebels, after five years of closure due to the crisis on September 19 th 2002, APA noted.

According to Minister Bakayoko, the reinstatement of the post office of Cote-d�Ivoire in the central, northern and western areas formerly controlled by the ex-rebels will be marked by the reopening of 72 offices and 4 regional management offices.

“We are grateful to the New Forces on behalf of the government, because we were happy to note that the Bouake post office remained untouched”, he said, further telling the New Forces that “their revolution has been useful”.

After Bouake, the Ivorian minister headed for Korhogo and Ferkessedougou, in the northern part where he will on Wednesday commission the reopening of the post offices in those cities.

That first move of reinstatement of the Ivorian post offices is billed to end Thursday in Seguela, central-east of the country.

Mr. Bakayoko pledged that other offices, mainly those of Man and Odienne will also reopen later this year.

“Today the first action for the redeployment of the administration should be the redeployment of the postal administration”, the NITC minister disclosed.

October 9th is a memorial day for the Ivorian post office, because of the reopening of the office of Bouake, as “today is the day when the entire world is celebrating the World Post Office Day”, he further said.

Like several other services, the Ivorian post office had closed its offices in the cities controlled by the former rebels after the coup attempt of September 19th, 2002 against the regime of Laurent Gbagbo.

The country seems to recover peace and reunification thanks to the Ouagadougou agreement of March 4th 2007, signed by President Laurent Gbagbo and the leader of the former rebels, Guillaume Soro, now Prime Minister, following negotiations chaired by the facilitator Blaise Compaor�

Published by API*APN africanpress@chello.no source.apa

�Lagos (Nigeria) The Board of Directors of the African Development Fund (ADF), the soft-loan arm of the African Development Bank Group (AfDB), Wednesday approved a loan of 51 million Units of Account (about US$79.4 million) to finance an important rural water supply and sanitation project in Nigeria.

The Bank Group said in a statement in Tunis that the project would improve the social wellbeing and health of the people in Yobe and Osun States towards poverty eradication through the sustainable development of water and sanitation facilities.

It said the project would provide adequate and safe water and sanitation services to the rural population in Nigeria and strengthen sector capacity for programme implementation and effective operation and maintenance.

“The project will increase water coverage in the two considered states to 100 percent by 2015 from the current level of 46.40 percent in Yobe and 44.72 percent in Osun. Sanitation coverage will increase to 90 percent by 2015 as against 33.60 percent in Yobe and 29.20 percent in Osun actually.

“Among its socio-economic impacts, the project will lower infant mortality rate from 110.6 per 1000 to 30.3 per 1000 in 2015. Under 5 mortality rate will also decrease from 193.6 to 63.7 in 2015. Primary school enrolment will increase from 67.7 percent to 100 percent in 2015. The average distance to the nearest water point will be reduced from 15 km to less than 500 m by 2012.

�Per capita basic water consumption will increase from 15 l per capita per day to 20 l/c/d by 2012,” it said.

The statement said that the target population is 3.32 million for water facilities and 2.98 million for sanitation services and that the sub-programmes would thus contribute up to 3.60 percent to the national targets with regards to safe water supply in line with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

“Its contribution to the national sanitation target is estimated at 3.23 percent,” it said..

According to the statement, the project falls within the framework of Nigeria�s Rural Water Supply and Sanitation (RWSS) Programme, developed through financial assistance from the AfDB.

Nigeria�s RWSS Programme includes investment sub-programmes for the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The Bank�s intervention under ADF 10 (2005-2007) targets the two states of Yobe and Osun.

Nigeria has a population of about 140 million (2005) with 70.30 million (52.2 percent), living in the rural areas.

Published by API*APN africanpress@chello.no source.apa